MACHINE GUN – Machine Gun (MU Records ‎– MU 1001 / LP-1988)

Label: MU Records ‎– MU 1001

Format: Vinyl, LP / Country: US / Released: 1988

Style: Experimental, Jazz-Rock, Free Improvisation

Side A recorded live at the Court Tavern, N.B., N.J.

Side B recorded live at CBGB's N.Y.C., except Trinity Rain recorded

at Trinity College, Hartford, Conn.

All tracks improvised

Cover design by – Thi Linh Le

Produced by – Robert Musso

Engineered by – Tom Ruff

Mastered by – Howie Weinberg

℗ 1988 MU Records / Printed in Canada

Matrix / Runout (A-Side Runout, Etched): MU 1001 SA QΔ 1-1

Matrix / Runout (B-Side Runout, Etched): MU 1001 SB QΔ-X 1-1

side 1:

A1 - In Court ............................................................................................................. 5:53

A2 - The Opening Of Entry ....................................................................................... 3:30

A3 - Fancy Products ................................................................................................. 3:46

A4 - Prancing In Your Bed ........................................................................................ 4:48

A5 - Dive ................................................................................................................... 3:50

side 2:

B1 - Myffy's 1st Date ................................................................................................ 2:49

B2 - The .8 Factor .................................................................................................... 3:58

B3 - One For The Chipper ........................................................................................ 2:04

B4 - Trinity Rain ........................................................................................................ 3:21

B5 - Hierocryptics ..................................................................................................... 5:52

Personnel:

Thomas Chapin – saxophone, flute

Robert Musso – guitar, 6-string bass, electronics [ambient tapes]

Jair-Rohm Parker Wells – electric bass

Bil Bryant – drums [acoustic and electric drums]

John Richey – electronics [vocal cut-up's, tapes]

with guests:

Sonny Sharrock – guitar

Karl Berger – melodica, voice

Thomas Chapin (March 9, 1957 – February 13, 1998) was an American composer and saxophonist/multi-instrumentalist. Though primarily an alto saxophonist, he also played sopranino, as well as soprano, tenor, baritone saxes and flute.

Many of his recordings as a leader featured his trio with drummer Michael Sarin and bassist Mario Pavone, occasionally joined by guests, as well as founding Machine Gun, a free-funk-free-jazz-rock band with guitarist/producer/engineer Robert Musso.

Chapin studied with Jackie McLean and Paul Jeffrey.

Chapin died of leukemia three weeks before his 41st birthday. He last played two weeks before his death, at a benefit concert.

Karl Berger / Sonny Sharrock

For all practical purposes, this is the very first Machine Gun record, comprised of two live performances in New Jersey and New York. Machine Gun was a band that played hybrid forms of rock, jazz, and funk, all from an outsider's perspective. Personnel were the late saxophonist Thomas Chapin, guitarist Robert Musso, drummer Bill Bryant, bassist Jair-Rohm Parker Wells, and vocalist and electronic cutup artist John Richey. Special guests on these dates included the late guitarist Sonny Sharrock and Karl Berger (melodica, voice). From the opening skronk of "In Court," it's obvious that Machine Gun plays high-energy, visceral music. There are riffs and form, but lots of improvisation follows that form, and mutates it further into other forms. Feedback, tape manipulation, and hard rock and punk attitude are at the heart of the Machine Gun approach to music and noisemaking. On "Fancy Products," a striated funk riff is wound around itself and a vocal until it becomes a harmolodic jazz riff that collapses in on itself before remerging as a colossal free improv jam where Chapin and Musso trade out eights for the remainder.

On the New York CBGB's date, which covers the latter half of the disc, percussion and guitars create sparkling shards of rhythm as Berger plays a melodica through the center of "Muffy's 1st Date," turning around a small lyric idea until it gradually expands out to involve the entire band in its hypnotic simplicity. Here again, there is little refinement to the approach -- just an insistence on energy and forward thrust as the dynamic range collapses by the seventh or eighth track. This is very interesting.... and performance promise incredible sense of space and sounds, and in the end you get it all in the best possible manner .... Great album!

(Review by B. Bismount)

If you find it, buy this album!